U.S. patent number 11,327,987 [Application Number 16/460,664] was granted by the patent office on 2022-05-10 for configuring service consoles based on service feature templates using a database system.
This patent grant is currently assigned to Salesforce, Inc.. The grantee listed for this patent is salesforce.com, inc.. Invention is credited to Gautam Vasudev, Frederic Voituret.
United States Patent |
11,327,987 |
Vasudev , et al. |
May 10, 2022 |
Configuring service consoles based on service feature templates
using a database system
Abstract
Disclosed are examples of systems, apparatus, methods and
computer program products for configuring service consoles based on
service feature templates using a database system. In some
implementations, a database of a database system storing service
feature templates can be maintained. A request for a service
console comprising a console component can be processed. A service
feature template comprising a template console component
corresponding to the console component can be identified. A set of
CRM records can be identified. It can be determined that a user has
access to the console component. A graphical representation of the
service console can be displayed in a user interface on a display
of a device of the user.
Inventors: |
Vasudev; Gautam (San Francisco,
CA), Voituret; Frederic (Joinville le Pont, FR) |
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
salesforce.com, inc. |
San Francisco |
CA |
US |
|
|
Assignee: |
Salesforce, Inc. (San
Francisco, CA)
|
Family
ID: |
1000006294720 |
Appl.
No.: |
16/460,664 |
Filed: |
July 2, 2019 |
Prior Publication Data
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|
Document
Identifier |
Publication Date |
|
US 20190324971 A1 |
Oct 24, 2019 |
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Related U.S. Patent Documents
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Application
Number |
Filing Date |
Patent Number |
Issue Date |
|
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15154011 |
May 13, 2016 |
10387439 |
|
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62217442 |
Sep 11, 2015 |
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Current U.S.
Class: |
1/1 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G06F
16/25 (20190101); G06Q 30/016 (20130101); H04L
41/5064 (20130101); G06F 16/22 (20190101) |
Current International
Class: |
G06F
16/00 (20190101); H04L 41/5061 (20220101); G06Q
30/00 (20120101); G06F 16/25 (20190101); G06F
16/22 (20190101) |
Field of
Search: |
;707/791 |
References Cited
[Referenced By]
U.S. Patent Documents
Other References
US. Office Action dated Nov. 8, 2018 issued in U.S. Appl. No.
15/154,011. cited by applicant .
U.S. Notice of Allowance dated 45/2019 issued in U.S. Appl. No.
15/154,011. cited by applicant .
"Google Plus Users", Google+Ripples, Oct. 31, 2011 [retrieved on
Feb. 21, 2012 from Internet at
http://www.googleplusers.com/google-ripples.html], 3 pages. cited
by applicant.
|
Primary Examiner: Le; Thu Nguyet T
Attorney, Agent or Firm: Weaver Austin Villeneuve &
Sampson LLP
Claims
What is claimed is:
1. A system providing website customization to facilitate customer
engagement for accessing and processing data, the system
comprising: a database system comprising one or more processors,
the database system configurable to cause: identifying, based on a
request, a plurality of templates, each template stored in a
database, each template defining a layout and a functionality of at
least one or more components of one or more web pages; displaying a
list of the templates in a user interface on a display of a user
device; obtaining, from the user device, a selection of a first one
of the templates in the list, the first template being
user-configurable and defining a layout and a functionality of a
first one or more components; obtaining, from the user device, one
or more edits to the first template; editing the first template
according to the one or more edits to cause one or more changes to
the first one or more components as defined by the first template,
the one or more changes to the first one or more components
configuring two or more of: a knowledge management feature of one
or more web pages, a case management feature of the one or more web
pages, or a profile management feature of the one or more web
pages; displaying a graphical representation of the first one or
more components in the user interface on the display of the user
device, the graphical representation of the first one or more
components indicating the one or more changes configuring the two
or more of: the knowledge management feature, the case management
feature, or the profile management feature; and providing, through
one or more collaborative social features, social engagement for
the edited first template and management of content associated with
the edited first template by at least one of: a customer, a
partner, or an employee of an organization associated with the
database system.
2. The system of claim 1, the database system further configurable
to cause: displaying in the user interface a visual indicator
indicating that the first one or more components has been
generated.
3. The system of claim 1, the database system further configurable
to cause: displaying in the user interface a list of console
components comprising the first one or more components.
4. The system of claim 1, the database system further configurable
to cause: identifying a customer relationship management (CRM)
record as being associated with the first template; and updating
the graphical representation of the first one or more components to
present at least a portion of data of the identified CRM
record.
5. The system of claim 1, the database system further configurable
to cause: determining that an updated version of the first template
was created, the updated version of the first template being
associated with at least one updated component.
6. The system of claim 5, the database system further configurable
to cause: responsive to the determination that the updated version
of the first template was created, displaying a feed item in a
social network feed in a second user interface, the feed item
comprising or identifying the updated version of the first
template.
7. The system of claim 1, wherein the first one or more components
comprises at least one of: a case highlight, a knowledge article
sidebar, a case contact lookup, or a case milestone.
8. The system of claim 1, the first one or more components
providing one or more of: performance of one or more tasks,
customer submission of one or more cases, identification of one or
more knowledge articles, or management of one or more sales
opportunities.
9. The system of claim 1, wherein the first template is configured
to use templating language to define how content is processed and
rendered.
10. The system of claim 1, wherein the first template is configured
to use one or more other templates for one or more parts of
content.
11. A method comprising: identifying, based on a request, a
plurality of templates, each template stored in a database, each
template defining a layout and a functionality of at least one or
more components of one or more web pages; causing display of a list
of the templates in a user interface on a display of a user device;
obtaining, from the user device, a selection of a first one of the
templates in the list, the first template being user-configurable
and defining a layout and a functionality of a first one or more
components; obtaining, from the user device, one or more edits to
the first template; editing the first template according to the one
or more edits to cause one or more changes to the first one or more
components as defined by the first template, the one or more
changes to the first one or more components configuring two or more
of: a knowledge management feature of one or more web pages, a case
management feature of the one or more web pages, or a profile
management feature of the one or more web pages; causing display of
a graphical representation of the first one or more components in
the user interface on the display of the user device, the graphical
representation of the first one or more components indicating the
one or more changes configuring the two or more of: the knowledge
management feature, the case management feature, or the profile
management feature; and providing, through one or more
collaborative social features, social engagement for the edited
first template and management of content associated with the edited
first template by at least one of: a customer, a partner, or an
employee of an organization associated with a database system.
12. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising: causing
display in the user interface of a visual indicator indicating that
the first one or more components has been generated.
13. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising: causing
display in the user interface of a list of console components
comprising the first one or more components.
14. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising:
identifying a customer relationship management (CRM) record as
being associated with the first template; and updating the
graphical representation of the first one or more components to
present at least a portion of data of the identified CRM
record.
15. The method of claim 11, the method further comprising:
determining that an updated version of the first template was
created, the updated version of the first template being associated
with at least one updated component.
16. The method of claim 15, the method further comprising:
responsive to the determination that the updated version of the
first template was created, displaying a feed item in a social
network feed in a second user interface, the feed item comprising
or identifying the updated version of the first template.
17. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing
computer-readable program code to be executed by at least one
processor, the program code comprising instructions configurable to
cause: identifying, based on a request, a plurality of templates,
each template stored in a database, each template defining a layout
and a functionality of at least one or more components of one or
more web pages; displaying a list of the templates in a user
interface on a display of a user device; obtaining, from the user
device, a selection of a first one of the templates in the list,
the first template being user-configurable and defining a layout
and a functionality of a first one or more components; obtaining,
from the user device, one or more edits to the first template;
editing the first template according to the one or more edits to
cause one or more changes to the first one or more components as
defined by the first template, the one or more changes to the first
one or more components configuring two or more of: a knowledge
management feature of one or more web pages, a case management
feature of the one or more web pages, or a profile management
feature of the one or more web pages; displaying a graphical
representation of the first one or more components in the user
interface on the display of the user device, the graphical
representation of the first one or more components indicating the
one or more changes configuring the two or more of: the knowledge
management feature, the case management feature, or the profile
management feature; and providing, through one or more
collaborative social features, social engagement for the edited
first template and management of content associated with the edited
first template by at least one of: a customer, a partner, or an
employee of an organization associated with a database system.
18. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, the
instructions further configurable to cause: displaying in the user
interface a visual indicator indicating that the first one or more
components has been generated.
19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, the
instructions further configurable to cause: displaying in the user
interface a list of console components comprising the first one or
more components.
20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, the
instructions further configurable to cause: identifying a customer
relationship management (CRM) record as being associated with the
first template; and updating the graphical representation of the
first one or more components to present at least a portion of data
of the identified CRM record.
21. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, the
instructions further configurable to cause: determining that an
updated version of the first template was created, the updated
version of the first template being associated with at least one
updated component.
22. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 21, the
instructions further configurable to cause: responsive to the
determination that the updated version of the first template was
created, displaying a feed item in a social network feed in a
second user interface, the feed item comprising or identifying the
updated version of the first template.
23. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17,
wherein the first one or more components comprises at least one of:
a case highlight, a knowledge article sidebar, a case contact
lookup, or a case milestone.
Description
COPYRIGHT NOTICE
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains
material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright
owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of
the patent document or the patent disclosure as it appears in the
United States Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records
but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
INCORPORATION BY REFERENCE
An Application Data Sheet is filed concurrently with this
specification as part of the present application. Each application
that the present application claims benefit of or priority to as
identified in the concurrently filed Application Data Sheet is
incorporated by reference herein in its entirety and for all
purposes.
TECHNICAL FIELD
This patent document generally relates to service consoles in the
context of database systems. More specifically, this patent
document discloses techniques for configuring service consoles
based on service feature templates using a database system.
BACKGROUND
"Cloud computing" services provide shared resources, applications,
and information to computers and other devices upon request. In
cloud computing environments, services can be provided by one or
more servers accessible over the Internet rather than installing
software locally on in-house computer systems. As such, users
having a variety of roles can interact with cloud computing
services.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The included drawings are for illustrative purposes and serve only
to provide examples of possible structures and operations for the
disclosed inventive systems, apparatus, methods and computer
program products. These drawings in no way limit any changes in
form and detail that may be made by one skilled in the art without
departing from the spirit and scope of the disclosed
implementations.
FIG. 1 shows a system diagram of an example of a system 100 for
configuring service consoles based on service feature templates, in
accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 2 shows a flow chart of an example of a method 200 for
configuring service consoles based on service feature templates
using a database system, in accordance with some
implementations.
FIG. 3 shows an example of a user interface 300 in the form of a
graphical user interface (GUI) as displayed on a computing device
for requesting a service console to be generated according to a
service feature template, in accordance with some
implementations.
FIG. 4 shows an example of a user interface 400 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list of service
consoles generated according to service feature templates, in
accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 5 shows an example of a user interface 500 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list of
template console components generated according to service feature
templates, in accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 6 shows an example of a user interface 600 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a service console
generated based on a service feature template, in accordance with
some implementations.
FIG. 7 shows an example of a user interface 700 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list of
template console components generated according to service feature
templates, in accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 8A shows an example of a user interface 800a in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device for requesting a service
console to be generated according to a service feature template, in
accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 8B shows an example of a user interface 800b, which is an
updated version of user interface 800a, in the form of a GUI as
displayed on a computing device, in accordance with some
implementations.
FIG. 9A shows a block diagram of an example of an environment 10 in
which an on-demand database service can be used in accordance with
some implementations.
FIG. 9B shows a block diagram of an example of some implementations
of elements of FIG. 9A and various possible interconnections
between these elements.
FIG. 10A shows a system diagram of an example of architectural
components of an on-demand database service environment 900, in
accordance with some implementations.
FIG. 10B shows a system diagram further illustrating an example of
architectural components of an on-demand database service
environment, in accordance with some implementations.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
Examples of systems, apparatus, methods and computer-readable
storage media according to the disclosed implementations are
described in this section. These examples are being provided solely
to add context and aid in the understanding of the disclosed
implementations. It will thus be apparent to one skilled in the art
that implementations may be practiced without some or all of these
specific details. In other instances, certain operations have not
been described in detail to avoid unnecessarily obscuring
implementations. Other applications are possible, such that the
following examples should not be taken as definitive or limiting
either in scope or setting.
In the following detailed description, references are made to the
accompanying drawings, which form a part of the description and in
which are shown, by way of illustration, specific implementations.
Although these implementations are described in sufficient detail
to enable one skilled in the art to practice the disclosed
implementations, it is understood that these examples are not
limiting, such that other implementations may be used and changes
may be made without departing from their spirit and scope. For
example, the operations of methods shown and described herein are
not necessarily performed in the order indicated. It should also be
understood that the methods may include more or fewer operations
than are indicated. In some implementations, operations described
herein as separate operations may be combined. Conversely, what may
be described herein as a single operation may be implemented in
multiple operations.
Some of the disclosed implementations of systems, apparatus,
methods and computer program products are for configuring service
consoles based on service feature templates. For example, a new
customer of a cloud-based service console can quickly try out
different layouts and configurations of service consoles through
service feature templates configured to implement the desired
functionality in a service console. In another example, an existing
customer may add a recently released feature to their cloud-based
service console through a selection of a service feature template.
In some implementations, a service console is a graphical user
interface combining tabs, subtabs, and components to quickly and
efficiently address customer concerns in an enterprise environment.
As such, a service console can streamline the help desk experience
in one easy-to-use user interface.
In a conventional enterprise computing system providing integrated
social networking and customer relationship management (CRM)
databases and services, there can be a multitude of features
available to a user. Features include social network feeds, case
history, multi-channel publishers, etc. However, a user may only
wish to use some of the available features of the enterprise
computing system. Unused features, however, could improve the
user's productivity and experience when interacting with the
enterprise computing system. In conventional scenarios, when a user
wants to try new features, a system administrator manually
configures and implements the features for the user, which might
take weeks or even months to implement. These features are often
never implemented because of the complexity in setting them up for
the user. In addition, features are also not implemented because
the rate at which new features are released can outpace system
administrator resources for implementing the new features.
Consequently, users are sometimes left without features that would
otherwise improve their job performance.
By way of illustration, Super Calc is a calculator manufacturing
company with a long history of providing difficult to operate but
useful calculators. In order to improve their customer service,
Super Calc created an account with salesforce.com, inc. in 2010.
Super Calc, with the help of an outside consulting firm,
implemented the latest features provided by salesforce.com, inc.
and saw an immediate improvement in their customer service
operations. Malcolm, a customer service representative at Super
Calc, was able to handle more calls and emails than ever
before.
As a consequence of an economic crisis three years later, Super
Calc's sales are down, and many of Malcolm's customer service team
members have been laid off. Also in those three years,
salesforce.com added many new features that would further improve
the customer service at Super Calc. Implementation of these new
features would allow Malcolm to handle calls and emails that
otherwise would have been handled by the laid off team members.
Unfortunately, Super Calc does not have the extra capital necessary
to hire a consulting firm to implement these new features. Without
these features, customer service declines and Super Calc suffers
further financial losses from the loss of customers.
However, the most recent salesforce.com, inc. release includes some
examples of the disclosed techniques, which can be implemented to
configure a service console based on service feature templates. By
way of example, Malcolm can navigate to a page maintained by
salesforce.com, inc. that includes the new feature: "Knowledge One
Sidebar". In order to try out this new feature, Malcolm selects the
service feature template for "Knowledge One Sidebar". Upon
selection, a service console is set up automatically with the
Knowledge One Sidebar in Malcolm's user environment, allowing
Malcolm to quickly begin using this feature and respond to the
extra calls and emails. Super Calc is so impressed with the
productivity gained from using the updated service console that
they want to modernize their entire salesforce.com experience for
all their employees. After informing their original outside
consulting firm that salesforce.com now includes easily accessible
service feature templates for new and existing features, Super Calc
is able to negotiate a new and more financially favorable
consulting contract with the outside consulting firm.
These and other implementations may be embodied in various types of
hardware, software, firmware, and combinations thereof. For
example, some techniques disclosed herein may be implemented, at
least in part, by computer-readable media that include program
instructions, state information, etc., for performing various
services and operations described herein. Examples of program
instructions include both machine code, such as produced by a
compiler, and files containing higher-level code that may be
executed by a computing device such as a server or other data
processing apparatus using an interpreter. Examples of
computer-readable media include, but are not limited to, magnetic
media such as hard disks, floppy disks, and magnetic tape; optical
media such as CD-ROM disks; magneto-optical media; and hardware
devices that are specially configured to store program
instructions, such as read-only memory ("ROM") devices and random
access memory ("RAM") devices. These and other features of the
disclosed implementations will be described in more detail below
with reference to the associated drawings.
In some but not all implementations, the disclosed methods,
apparatus, systems, and computer-readable storage media may be
configured or designed for use in a multi-tenant database
environment.
The term "multi-tenant database system" can refer to those systems
in which various elements of hardware and software of a database
system may be shared by one or more customers. For example, a given
application server may simultaneously process requests for a great
number of customers, and a given database table may store rows of
data such as feed items for a potentially much greater number of
customers. The term "query plan" generally refers to one or more
operations used to access information in a database system.
A "user profile" or "user's profile" is generally configured to
store and maintain data about a given user of the database system.
The data can include general information, such as name, title,
phone number, a photo, a biographical summary, and a status, e.g.,
text describing what the user is currently doing. As mentioned
below, the data can include messages created by other users. Where
there are multiple tenants, a user is typically associated with a
particular tenant. For example, a user could be a salesperson of a
company, which is a tenant of the database system that provides a
database service.
The term "record" generally refers to a data entity, such as an
instance of a data object created by a user of the database
service, for example, about a particular (actual or potential)
business relationship or project. The data object can have a data
structure defined by the database service (a standard object) or
defined by a user (custom object). For example, a record can be for
a business partner or potential business partner (e.g., a client,
vendor, distributor, etc.) of the user, and can include information
describing an entire company, subsidiaries, or contacts at the
company. As another example, a record can be a project that the
user is working on, such as an opportunity (e.g., a possible sale)
with an existing partner, or a project that the user is trying to
get. In one implementation of a multi-tenant database system, each
record for the tenants has a unique identifier stored in a common
table. A record has data fields that are defined by the structure
of the object (e.g., fields of certain data types and purposes). A
record can also have custom fields defined by a user. A field can
be another record or include links thereto, thereby providing a
parent-child relationship between the records.
FIG. 1 shows a system diagram of an example of a system 100 for
configuring service consoles based on service feature templates
using a database system, in accordance with some implementations.
System 100 includes a variety of different hardware and/or software
components which are in communication with each other. In the
non-limiting example of FIG. 1, system 100 includes at least one
enterprise server 104, at least one CRM database 112, and at least
template database 116. CRM database 112 can store and maintain data
objects such as CRM records of an organization. CRM records include
instances of accounts, opportunities, leads, cases, contacts,
contracts, campaigns, solutions, quotes, purchase orders, etc.
Template database 116 can store and maintain data objects
representing service feature templates. In some implementations, a
service feature template can include a collection of the following:
a set of navigation tab items, navigation tab orientation (e.g.
pinned, vertical, or horizontal), a set of footer components, a set
of page layouts, a set of case feed settings, a set of Live Agent
settings, a set of entitlement settings, a set of service level
agreement settings, and a set of social customer service settings.
User system 108 can interact with system 100 by sending and
receiving data to and from one or more servers and/or databases of
system 100. Also or alternatively, a service feature template can
include an associated version or version number.
Enterprise server 104 may communicate with other components of
system 100. This communication may be facilitated through a
combination of networks and interfaces. Enterprise server 104 may
handle and process data requests from user system 108. Likewise,
enterprise server 104 may return a response to user system 108
after a data request has been processed. For example, enterprise
server 104 may retrieve data from one or more databases, combine
some or all of the data from different databases, and send the
processed data to user system 108.
Also or alternatively, enterprise server 104 can be configured to
process organization specific CRM data in combination with service
feature templates. In some implementations, a user may request to
generate a service console using a service feature template. For
example, based on a request by a user, enterprise server 104 can
set up a live chat system tailored to large volume, but quick
resolution case management. As such, a customer can save thousands
of dollars by not implementing the live chat system themselves and
by not hiring a consultant to assist in implementing the live chat
system.
User system 108 may be a computing device capable of communicating
via one or more data networks with a server. Examples of user
system 108 include a desktop computer or portable electronic device
such as a smartphone, a tablet, a laptop, a wearable device such as
Google Glass.RTM., another optical head-mounted display (OHMD)
device, a smart watch, etc.
FIG. 2 shows a flow chart of an example of a method 200 for
configuring service consoles based on service feature templates
using a database system, in accordance with some implementations.
Method 200 and other methods described herein may be implemented
using system 100 of FIG. 1, although the implementations of such
methods are not limited to system 100.
In block 204 of FIG. 2, a server such as enterprise server 104 of
FIG. 1 processes a request to generate a service console. In some
implementations, enterprise server 104 receives a request from user
system 108, for instance, a user selecting create button 420 of
FIG. 4 can send a request to enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1. In
other implementations, the request can originate from enterprise
server 104.
A service console can allow a customer service representative to
monitor and respond through a variety of customer channels from one
screen. Additionally, a service console may be a combination of
many console components. Console components can provide help desk
functionality to assist customer service representatives in
particular aspects of their job, for instance, an interaction log
panel, which shows the history of past communications with a
customer. In some implementations, a service console includes
navigation tabs for selecting CRM records, a primary tab for
displaying the main item, e.g. a case being worked on, and subtab
that displays items related to the primary tab, e.g. a contact for
a case.
For example, FIG. 3 shows an example of a user interface 300 in the
form of a graphical user interface (GUI) as displayed on a
computing device for requesting a service console to be generated
according to a service feature template, in accordance with some
implementations. In this example, a user of user system 108 of FIG.
1 may be presented with service feature templates 304a, 304b, and
304c of FIG. 3. These service feature templates may correspond to a
graphical representation of a service console that can be generated
by enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1. For each of service feature
templates 304a, 304b, and 304c of FIG. 3, there may be a
corresponding creation total. For example, service feature template
304a includes a creation total 312a of "1," which indicates that
one console has been created based on the "Standard Console"
template. Similarly, service console 304c has a creation total 312b
of "3," indicating that three consoles have been created based on
the "Collaboration Console" template. As seen in FIG. 3, by
selecting service feature template 304a, a user could request a
"Standard Console" to be generated by enterprise server 104 of FIG.
1. In some implementations, a "Standard Console" is a basic service
console that includes basic console components for checking out
essential features of the service console. Also or alternatively, a
user could select service feature template 304b of FIG. 3 for a
"Live Agent Console," which is a service console that includes
console components for a call center agent. Also or alternatively,
a user could select service feature template 304c for a
"Collaboration Console," which is a service console with
collaborative social features such as a case feed. In other
implementations, a user may select a component template 308 to
generate a console component of a service console. A component
template can be a more granular form of a template. For example, a
user may wish to generate a component based on a "Service Report"
component template. The service report component generated from the
component template can be generated independently and distinctly
from a particular service console. Also or alternatively, if any of
the service feature templates or component templates includes
features that aren't enabled for their organization or not yet
released to the public, then the service feature may have a dimmed
appearance indicating a lack of access. For example, the "Live
Agent" feature of service template 304b may have a release date six
months in the future, but in order to generate awareness of the
coming release, a dimmed version of service feature template 304b
may be displayed. However, a user would be unable to generate a
service console based on a dimmed version of a service feature
template. In some implementations, a combination of service feature
templates and component templates are identified and "chained"
together to provide a larger template with more sophisticated
functionality.
In another example, FIG. 8A shows an example of a user interface
800a in the form of a GUI as displayed on a computing device for
requesting a service console to be generated according to a service
feature template, in accordance with some implementations. A user
may select a category 804 of service feature templates to refine
the selection process. As seen in user interface 800a, a user may
select "Role" or "Industry" from category 804. A user may then
select a particular service feature template from the service
feature template list 808. As a user selects between "Role" and
"Industry," the service feature templates may be updated as shown
in user interface 800b. Also or alternatively, a user may change
the type of service feature templates to view in user interfaces
800a and 800b. In the example of FIGS. 8A and 8B a user is viewing
"Console" service feature templates. However, a user may change the
type from "Console" to "Component" to view component templates
according to "Role" and "Industry."
In block 208 of FIG. 2, enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1 identifies
a service feature template. In some implementations, a service
feature template can be stored among other service feature
templates at template database 116. In some implementations,
enterprise server 104 may identify a particular service feature
template based on data processed in block 204 of FIG. 2. In other
implementations, a service feature template can be identified
automatically in response to a system event such as a specific date
or in response to a user having a console component being
recommended by a coworker.
Examples of service feature templates include: "trial service
feature template," "email response service feature template,"
"computer-telephony integration (CTI) service feature template,"
"tier 3 service feature template," "telesales service feature
template," and "agent console service feature template." The "trial
service feature template" can be a service feature template that
showcases the best of and newest features of a product line. The
"email response service feature template" can be a service feature
template that is for high volume email and quick customer cases. A
customer service representative may typically know how to answer
the customer concern right away and without significant research.
The "CTI service feature template" is a service feature template
that can be tailored for call centers. The customer concerns in a
call center are usually minor issues that are quickly resolved, but
can also include an occasional long-running major issue. The "tier
3 service feature template" can be a service feature template that
is for an environment with front line support and tier 2 support.
Customer service representatives may need to catch up quickly and
collaborate with other experts. These cases are typically longer
running. The "telesales service feature template" can be a service
feature template that is for an environment where customer service
representatives rely on "call down lists" that they work their way
through. The calls are typically very quick, and customer service
representatives are compensated on the number of calls made. The
"agent console service feature template" can be a service feature
template that facilitates the transition from an older version of a
service console to a new version of a service console. Other
examples can include: "inside sales service feature template,"
"chat service feature template," and "omnichannel agent service
feature template."
In some implementations, an administrator can create a service
feature template from an existing view of a service console. The
administrator created service feature template may be stored in an
organization specific portion of template database 116 of FIG. 1
and later identified by enterprise server 104. To illustrate, an
outside consulting firm may wish to create service feature
templates to provide quick consulting services to customers that
have similar customer management needs for matters that the
consulting firm has previously worked on. For example, the
consulting firm may create a service feature template from Company
A's service console. This service console may be tailored to
addressing customer concerns regarding exotic pet birds. Company B
would like a service console for addressing customer concerns
regarding exotic pet turtles. As such, the consulting firm could
use the service feature template from Company A to give Company B
an idea of what their service console would look like. In other
implementations, a service provider maintaining system 100 may
provide and maintain service feature templates for customers of
their service. For example, user interface 800b of FIG. 8 includes
service feature template list 808, which provides a list of service
feature templates particularly tailored to different industries,
e.g. healthcare, financial, telecommunications, etc. A
telecommunications executive interested in trying out a service
console tailored to a telecommunications company could select
"DTelecom" from service feature template list 808. Advantageously,
this allows the executive to immediately try out a
telecommunications service console environment without significant
financial investment.
In block 212 of FIG. 2, CRM records are identified by enterprise
server 104 of FIG. 1. In some implementations, enterprise server
104 may identify CRM records located in CRM database 112 based on a
user profile of user system 108 and/or an organization associated
with the user profile. In some implementations, CRM records most
relevant to the user are identified. For example, a user may be
prompted to specify CRM records to be used with the service feature
template. Thus, allowing a service console to be populated with
data that is familiar and easy to interact with for the user.
FIG. 4 shows an example of a user interface 400 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list of service
consoles generated according to service feature templates, in
accordance with some implementations. User interface 400 can
display a list view of the generated service consoles. The list
view includes different fields, for instance, name field 404, date
created field 408, description field 412, and actions field 416. In
other implementations, the list view can include different fields
such as a "created by field" or "last updated field." A user can
sort the list of service feature templates by any of the fields. By
way of example in FIG. 4, the service feature templates are sorted
by template name field 404. In addition, date created field 408
displays the date a respective service feature was created. As
well, description field 412 displays a brief description of a
respective service feature template to easily ascertain the type of
service feature template. Actions field 416 can receive selections
from a user in order to "view," "edit," or "configure" a service
console based on a service feature template. Also or alternatively,
actions field 416 could also include other selections such as
"revert," "uninstall," "share," or "view in different environment."
As discussed above regarding block 212 of FIG. 2, a user can
specify existing CRM records by selecting "configure" from actions
field 416. While some CRM records may automatically be provided by
enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1, when the user selects "configure,"
the user may change or add CRM records to be populated according to
the service feature template. Also, a user may select "view" from
actions field 416 of FIG. 4, which can cause enterprise server 104
of FIG. 1 to display a preview of a service console based on a
respective service feature template. In some implementations, a
user selection "view" from actions field 416 may be presented with
a test instance or "sandboxed" version of the user's environment.
The sandboxed version of a user's environment allows the user to
interact with their data, but it does not allow the user to make
permanent changes. Thus, a user may test or change a service
feature template without compromising important CRM data. In some
implementations, a user may select "edit" from actions field 416 of
FIG. 4. This may cause user interface 400 to be refreshed and
updated with user interface 500 as seen in FIG. 5.
FIG. 5 shows an example of a user interface 500 in the form of a
GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list of
template console components generated according to service feature
templates, in accordance with some implementations. A user may
select template name field 504 and input text to create a new name
for a service feature template. Template console component list 508
includes the template console components that make up the service
feature template. Template console component list 508 includes the
following template console components: "Lookup Case Contact," "Case
Highlights," "Knowledge One Sidebar," "Topics," "Milestones," and
"Case Experts." After reviewing template name field 504 and
template console component list 508, a user may select submission
button 512.
In block 216 of FIG. 2, enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1 determines
that a user profile can access a console component. Whether a user
profile has access to a console component may depend on whether the
user has sufficient permissions to access the console component. In
some implementations, if a user has the required license to access
a console component, then enterprise server 104 may proceed to
block 220 of FIG. 2 discussed below. For example, if a user does
not have a license for the console component knowledge articles,
then the user would be informed by an indication in the user
interface that the user lacked the required license. However, if
user has a license for the knowledge article console component and
the user, but the user does not have the knowledge article enabled
for use, then enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1 could enable the
knowledge article component and make it available for use in the
generated service console.
For example, FIG. 6 shows an example of a user interface 600 in the
form of a GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a
service console generated based on a service feature template, in
accordance with some implementations. Similar to user interface 500
of FIG. 5, user interface 600 of FIG. 6 includes template name
field 604, console component list 608, and submission button 612.
Status indicator 616 represents whether or not a console component
was generated successfully or unsuccessfully. Status indicator 616
can be a green check mark to represent a successfully generated
console component and a red X to represent a console component that
was not generated. Also or alternatively, depending on a console
component status, status indicator 616 can be any positive
audiovisual indication and status indicator 616 can be any negative
audiovisual indication.
In block 220 of FIG. 2, a console component can be generated based
on a template console component. As discussed above, if a user has
access to a console component, then enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1
may generate the console component. In some implementations, data
from CRM database 112 and template database 116 are combined to
generate a service console, which may also be stored in template
database 116 or any other database of system 100. As discussed
above, a user may customize a service feature template. In addition
to this, a user may further customize template console components.
For example, FIG. 7 shows an example of a user interface 700 in the
form of a GUI as displayed on a computing device presenting a list
of template console components generated according to service
feature templates, in accordance with some implementations. In this
example, a user may select "view," "edit," or "configure" from
console component action field 712. Consequently, a user may
customize a service feature template at a more granular level to
further enhance their experience with a new service console.
In block 224 of FIG. 2, a service console is displayed by
enterprise server 104 of FIG. 1. For example, a user may navigate
to the service console via a hyperlink such as "view" from actions
field 416 of FIG. 4 in user interface 400. Also or alternatively, a
user can direct their mouse cursor over description field 412. For
example, as the mouse cursor remains near "Email Console," an
overlay popup window can display a small preview of a screenshot
appearance of "Service Console 1." In some implementations, the
overlay popup window displays an animated version of a preview. The
animated version may loop a brief video highlighting what is unique
about the service feature template. Also or alternatively, the
overlay popup windows may change appearance in near real-time as a
user directs their mouse cursor between descriptions. For example,
a mouse cursor hovering over "Email Console" may cause the
appearance of a service console that is used to quickly answer
short questions to customer concerns. As the mouse cursor navigates
away from "Email Console" to "Console with 2 Channels," user
interface 400 may be refreshed without interruption to show a
service console configured to customer concerns through email and
through social networking clients.
Systems, apparatus, and methods are described below for
implementing database systems and enterprise level social and
business information networking systems in conjunction with the
disclosed techniques. Such implementations can provide more
efficient use of a database system. For instance, a user of a
database system may not easily know when important information in
the database has changed, e.g., about a project or client. Such
implementations can provide feed tracked updates about such changes
and other events, thereby keeping users informed.
By way of example, a user can update a record in the form of a CRM
record, e.g., an opportunity such as a possible sale of 1000
computers. Once the record update has been made, a feed tracked
update about the record update can then automatically be provided,
e.g., in a feed, to anyone subscribing to the opportunity or to the
user. Thus, the user does not need to contact a manager regarding
the change in the opportunity, since the feed tracked update about
the update is sent via a feed to the manager's feed page or other
page.
FIG. 9A shows a block diagram of an example of an environment 10 in
which an on-demand database service exists and can be used in
accordance with some implementations. Environment 10 may include
user systems 12, network 14, database system 16, processor system
17, application platform 18, network interface 20, tenant data
storage 22, system data storage 24, program code 26, and process
space 28. In other implementations, environment 10 may not have all
of these components and/or may have other components instead of, or
in addition to, those listed above.
A user system 12 may be implemented as any computing device(s) or
other data processing apparatus such as a machine or system used by
a user to access a database system 16. For example, any of user
systems 12 can be a handheld and/or portable computing device such
as a mobile phone, a smartphone, a laptop computer, or a tablet.
Other examples of a user system include computing devices such as a
work station and/or a network of computing devices. As illustrated
in FIG. 9A (and in more detail in FIG. 9B) user systems 12 might
interact via a network 14 with an on-demand database service, which
is implemented in the example of FIG. 9A as database system 16.
An on-demand database service, implemented using system 16 by way
of example, is a service that is made available to users who do not
need to necessarily be concerned with building and/or maintaining
the database system. Instead, the database system may be available
for their use when the users need the database system, i.e., on the
demand of the users. Some on-demand database services may store
information from one or more tenants into tables of a common
database image to form a multi-tenant database system (MTS). A
database image may include one or more database objects. A
relational database management system (RDBMS) or the equivalent may
execute storage and retrieval of information against the database
object(s). Application platform 18 may be a framework that allows
the applications of system 16 to run, such as the hardware and/or
software, e.g., the operating system. In some implementations,
application platform 18 enables creation, managing and executing
one or more applications developed by the provider of the on-demand
database service, users accessing the on-demand database service
via user systems 12, or third party application developers
accessing the on-demand database service via user systems 12.
The users of user systems 12 may differ in their respective
capacities, and the capacity of a particular user system 12 might
be entirely determined by permissions (permission levels) for the
current user. For example, when a salesperson is using a particular
user system 12 to interact with system 16, the user system has the
capacities allotted to that salesperson. However, while an
administrator is using that user system to interact with system 16,
that user system has the capacities allotted to that administrator.
In systems with a hierarchical role model, users at one permission
level may have access to applications, data, and database
information accessible by a lower permission level user, but may
not have access to certain applications, database information, and
data accessible by a user at a higher permission level. Thus,
different users will have different capabilities with regard to
accessing and modifying application and database information,
depending on a user's security or permission level, also called
authorization.
Network 14 is any network or combination of networks of devices
that communicate with one another. For example, network 14 can be
any one or any combination of a LAN (local area network), WAN (wide
area network), telephone network, wireless network, point-to-point
network, star network, token ring network, hub network, or other
appropriate configuration. Network 14 can include a TCP/IP
(Transfer Control Protocol and Internet Protocol) network, such as
the global internetwork of networks often referred to as the
Internet. The Internet will be used in many of the examples herein.
However, it should be understood that the networks that the present
implementations might use are not so limited.
User systems 12 might communicate with system 16 using TCP/IP and,
at a higher network level, use other common Internet protocols to
communicate, such as HTTP, FTP, AFS, WAP, etc. In an example where
HTTP is used, user system 12 might include an HTTP client commonly
referred to as a "browser" for sending and receiving HTTP signals
to and from an HTTP server at system 16. Such an HTTP server might
be implemented as the sole network interface 20 between system 16
and network 14, but other techniques might be used as well or
instead. In some implementations, the network interface 20 between
system 16 and network 14 includes load sharing functionality, such
as round-robin HTTP request distributors to balance loads and
distribute incoming HTTP requests evenly over a plurality of
servers. At least for users accessing system 16, each of the
plurality of servers has access to the MTS' data; however, other
alternative configurations may be used instead.
In one implementation, system 16, shown in FIG. 9A, implements a
web-based CRM system. For example, in one implementation, system 16
includes application servers configured to implement and execute
CRM software applications as well as provide related data, code,
forms, web pages and other information to and from user systems 12
and to store to, and retrieve from, a database system related data,
objects, and Webpage content. With a multi-tenant system, data for
multiple tenants may be stored in the same physical database object
in tenant data storage 22, however, tenant data typically is
arranged in the storage medium(s) of tenant data storage 22 so that
data of one tenant is kept logically separate from that of other
tenants so that one tenant does not have access to another tenant's
data, unless such data is expressly shared. In certain
implementations, system 16 implements applications other than, or
in addition to, a CRM application. For example, system 16 may
provide tenant access to multiple hosted (standard and custom)
applications, including a CRM application. User (or third party
developer) applications, which may or may not include CRM, may be
supported by the application platform 18, which manages creation,
storage of the applications into one or more database objects and
executing of the applications in a virtual machine in the process
space of the system 16.
One arrangement for elements of system 16 is shown in FIGS. 9A and
9B, including a network interface 20, application platform 18,
tenant data storage 22 for tenant data 23, system data storage 24
for system data 25 accessible to system 16 and possibly multiple
tenants, program code 26 for implementing various functions of
system 16, and a process space 28 for executing MTS system
processes and tenant-specific processes, such as running
applications as part of an application hosting service. Additional
processes that may execute on system 16 include database indexing
processes.
Several elements in the system shown in FIG. 9A include
conventional, well-known elements that are explained only briefly
here. For example, each user system 12 could include a desktop
personal computer, workstation, laptop, PDA, cell phone, or any
wireless access protocol (WAP) enabled device or any other
computing device capable of interfacing directly or indirectly to
the Internet or other network connection. The term "computing
device" is also referred to herein simply as a "computer". User
system 12 typically runs an HTTP client, e.g., a browsing program,
such as Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser, Netscape's Navigator
browser, Opera's browser, or a WAP-enabled browser in the case of a
cell phone, PDA or other wireless device, or the like, allowing a
user (e.g., subscriber of the multi-tenant database system) of user
system 12 to access, process and view information, pages and
applications available to it from system 16 over network 14. Each
user system 12 also typically includes one or more user input
devices, such as a keyboard, a mouse, trackball, touch pad, touch
screen, pen or the like, for interacting with a GUI provided by the
browser on a display (e.g., a monitor screen, LCD display, OLED
display, etc.) of the computing device in conjunction with pages,
forms, applications and other information provided by system 16 or
other systems or servers. Thus, "display device" as used herein can
refer to a display of a computer system such as a monitor or
touch-screen display, and can refer to any computing device having
display capabilities such as a desktop computer, laptop, tablet,
smartphone, a television set-top box, or wearable device such
Google Glass.RTM. or other human body-mounted display apparatus.
For example, the display device can be used to access data and
applications hosted by system 16, and to perform searches on stored
data, and otherwise allow a user to interact with various GUI pages
that may be presented to a user. As discussed above,
implementations are suitable for use with the Internet, although
other networks can be used instead of or in addition to the
Internet, such as an intranet, an extranet, a virtual private
network (VPN), a non-TCP/IP based network, any LAN or WAN or the
like.
According to one implementation, each user system 12 and all of its
components are operator configurable using applications, such as a
browser, including computer code run using a central processing
unit such as an Intel Pentium.RTM. processor or the like.
Similarly, system 16 (and additional instances of an MTS, where
more than one is present) and all of its components might be
operator configurable using application(s) including computer code
to run using processor system 17, which may be implemented to
include a central processing unit, which may include an Intel
Pentium.RTM. processor or the like, and/or multiple processor
units. Non-transitory computer-readable media can have instructions
stored thereon/in, that can be executed by or used to program a
computing device to perform any of the methods of the
implementations described herein. Computer program code 26
implementing instructions for operating and configuring system 16
to intercommunicate and to process web pages, applications and
other data and media content as described herein is preferably
downloadable and stored on a hard disk, but the entire program
code, or portions thereof, may also be stored in any other volatile
or non-volatile memory medium or device as is well known, such as a
ROM or RAM, or provided on any media capable of storing program
code, such as any type of rotating media including floppy disks,
optical discs, digital versatile disk (DVD), compact disk (CD),
microdrive, and magneto-optical disks, and magnetic or optical
cards, nanosystems (including molecular memory ICs), or any other
type of computer-readable medium or device suitable for storing
instructions and/or data. Additionally, the entire program code, or
portions thereof, may be transmitted and downloaded from a software
source over a transmission medium, e.g., over the Internet, or from
another server, as is well known, or transmitted over any other
conventional network connection as is well known (e.g., extranet,
VPN, LAN, etc.) using any communication medium and protocols (e.g.,
TCP/IP, HTTP, HTTPS, Ethernet, etc.) as are well known. It will
also be appreciated that computer code for the disclosed
implementations can be realized in any programming language that
can be executed on a client system and/or server or server system
such as, for example, C, C++, HTML, any other markup language,
Java.TM., JavaScript, ActiveX, any other scripting language, such
as VBScript, and many other programming languages as are well known
may be used. (Java.TM. is a trademark of Sun Microsystems,
Inc.).
According to some implementations, each system 16 is configured to
provide web pages, forms, applications, data and media content to
user (client) systems 12 to support the access by user systems 12
as tenants of system 16. As such, system 16 provides security
mechanisms to keep each tenant's data separate unless the data is
shared. If more than one MTS is used, they may be located in close
proximity to one another (e.g., in a server farm located in a
single building or campus), or they may be distributed at locations
remote from one another (e.g., one or more servers located in city
A and one or more servers located in city B). As used herein, each
MTS could include one or more logically and/or physically connected
servers distributed locally or across one or more geographic
locations. Additionally, the term "server" is meant to refer to one
type of computing device such as a system including processing
hardware and process space(s), an associated storage medium such as
a memory device or database, and, in some instances, a database
application (e.g., OODBMS or RDBMS) as is well known in the art. It
should also be understood that "server system" and "server" are
often used interchangeably herein. Similarly, the database objects
described herein can be implemented as single databases, a
distributed database, a collection of distributed databases, a
database with redundant online or offline backups or other
redundancies, etc., and might include a distributed database or
storage network and associated processing intelligence.
FIG. 9B shows a block diagram of an example of some implementations
of elements of FIG. 9A and various possible interconnections
between these elements. That is, FIG. 9B also illustrates
environment 10. However, in FIG. 9B elements of system 16 and
various interconnections in some implementations are further
illustrated. FIG. 9B shows that user system 12 may include
processor system 12A, memory system 12B, input system 12C, and
output system 12D. FIG. 9B shows network 14 and system 16. FIG. 9B
also shows that system 16 may include tenant data storage 22,
tenant data 23, system data storage 24, system data 25, User
Interface (UI) 30, Application Program Interface (API) 32, PL/SOQL
34, save routines 36, application setup mechanism 38, application
servers 50.sub.1-50.sub.N, system process space 52, tenant process
spaces 54, tenant management process space 60, tenant storage space
62, user storage 64, and application metadata 66. In other
implementations, environment 10 may not have the same elements as
those listed above and/or may have other elements instead of, or in
addition to, those listed above.
User system 12, network 14, system 16, tenant data storage 22, and
system data storage 24 were discussed above in FIG. 9A. Regarding
user system 12, processor system 12A may be any combination of one
or more processors. Memory system 12B may be any combination of one
or more memory devices, short term, and/or long term memory. Input
system 12C may be any combination of input devices, such as one or
more keyboards, mice, trackballs, scanners, cameras, and/or
interfaces to networks. Output system 12D may be any combination of
output devices, such as one or more monitors, printers, and/or
interfaces to networks. As shown by FIG. 9B, system 16 may include
a network interface 20 (of FIG. 9A) implemented as a set of
application servers 50, an application platform 18, tenant data
storage 22, and system data storage 24. Also shown is system
process space 52, including individual tenant process spaces 54 and
a tenant management process space 60. Each application server 50
may be configured to communicate with tenant data storage 22 and
the tenant data 23 therein, and system data storage 24 and the
system data 25 therein to serve requests of user systems 12. The
tenant data 23 might be divided into individual tenant storage
spaces 62, which can be either a physical arrangement and/or a
logical arrangement of data. Within each tenant storage space 62,
user storage 64 and application metadata 66 might be similarly
allocated for each user. For example, a copy of a user's most
recently used (MRU) items might be stored to user storage 64.
Similarly, a copy of MRU items for an entire organization that is a
tenant might be stored to tenant storage space 62. A UI 30 provides
a user interface and an API 32 provides an application programmer
interface to system 16 resident processes to users and/or
developers at user systems 12. The tenant data and the system data
may be stored in various databases, such as one or more Oracle.RTM.
databases.
Application platform 18 includes an application setup mechanism 38
that supports application developers' creation and management of
applications, which may be saved as metadata into tenant data
storage 22 by save routines 36 for execution by subscribers as one
or more tenant process spaces 54 managed by tenant management
process 60 for example. Invocations to such applications may be
coded using PL/SOQL 34 that provides a programming language style
interface extension to API 32. A detailed description of some
PL/SOQL language implementations is discussed in commonly assigned
U.S. Pat. No. 7,730,478, titled METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR ALLOWING
ACCESS TO DEVELOPED APPLICATIONS VIA A MULTI-TENANT ON-DEMAND
DATABASE SERVICE, by Craig Weissman, issued on Jun. 1, 2010, and
hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety and for all
purposes. Invocations to applications may be detected by one or
more system processes, which manage retrieving application metadata
66 for the subscriber making the invocation and executing the
metadata as an application in a virtual machine.
Each application server 50 may be communicably coupled to database
systems, e.g., having access to system data 25 and tenant data 23,
via a different network connection. For example, one application
server 50.sub.1 might be coupled via the network 14 (e.g., the
Internet), another application server 50.sub.N-1 might be coupled
via a direct network link, and another application server 50.sub.N
might be coupled by yet a different network connection. Transfer
Control Protocol and Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) are typical
protocols for communicating between application servers 50 and the
database system. However, it will be apparent to one skilled in the
art that other transport protocols may be used to optimize the
system depending on the network interconnect used.
In certain implementations, each application server 50 is
configured to handle requests for any user associated with any
organization that is a tenant. Because it is desirable to be able
to add and remove application servers from the server pool at any
time for any reason, there is preferably no server affinity for a
user and/or organization to a specific application server 50. In
one implementation, therefore, an interface system implementing a
load balancing function (e.g., an F5 Big-IP load balancer) is
communicably coupled between the application servers 50 and the
user systems 12 to distribute requests to the application servers
50. In one implementation, the load balancer uses a least
connections algorithm to route user requests to the application
servers 50. Other examples of load balancing algorithms, such as
round robin and observed response time, also can be used. For
example, in certain implementations, three consecutive requests
from the same user could hit three different application servers
50, and three requests from different users could hit the same
application server 50. In this manner, by way of example, system 16
is multi-tenant, wherein system 16 handles storage of, and access
to, different objects, data and applications across disparate users
and organizations.
As an example of storage, one tenant might be a company that
employs a sales force where each salesperson uses system 16 to
manage their sales process. Thus, a user might maintain contact
data, leads data, customer follow-up data, performance data, goals
and progress data, etc., all applicable to that user's personal
sales process (e.g., in tenant data storage 22). In an example of a
MTS arrangement, since all of the data and the applications to
access, view, modify, report, transmit, calculate, etc., can be
maintained and accessed by a user system having nothing more than
network access, the user can manage his or her sales efforts and
cycles from any of many different user systems. For example, if a
salesperson is visiting a customer and the customer has Internet
access in their lobby, the salesperson can obtain critical updates
as to that customer while waiting for the customer to arrive in the
lobby.
While each user's data might be separate from other users' data
regardless of the employers of each user, some data might be
organization-wide data shared or accessible by a plurality of users
or all of the users for a given organization that is a tenant.
Thus, there might be some data structures managed by system 16 that
are allocated at the tenant level while other data structures might
be managed at the user level. Because an MTS might support multiple
tenants including possible competitors, the MTS should have
security protocols that keep data, applications, and application
use separate. Also, because many tenants may opt for access to an
MTS rather than maintain their own system, redundancy, up-time, and
backup are additional functions that may be implemented in the MTS.
In addition to user-specific data and tenant-specific data, system
16 might also maintain system level data usable by multiple tenants
or other data. Such system level data might include industry
reports, news, postings, and the like that are sharable among
tenants.
In certain implementations, user systems 12 (which may be client
systems) communicate with application servers 50 to request and
update system-level and tenant-level data from system 16 that may
involve sending one or more queries to tenant data storage 22
and/or system data storage 24. System 16 (e.g., an application
server 50 in system 16) automatically generates one or more SQL
statements (e.g., one or more SQL queries) that are designed to
access the desired information. System data storage 24 may generate
query plans to access the requested data from the database.
Each database can generally be viewed as a collection of objects,
such as a set of logical tables, containing data fitted into
predefined categories. A "table" is one representation of a data
object, and may be used herein to simplify the conceptual
description of objects and custom objects according to some
implementations. It should be understood that "table" and "object"
may be used interchangeably herein. Each table generally contains
one or more data categories logically arranged as columns or fields
in a viewable schema. Each row or record of a table contains an
instance of data for each category defined by the fields. For
example, a CRM database may include a table that describes a
customer with fields for basic contact information such as name,
address, phone number, fax number, etc. Another table might
describe a purchase order, including fields for information such as
customer, product, sale price, date, etc. In some multi-tenant
database systems, standard entity tables might be provided for use
by all tenants. For CRM database applications, such standard
entities might include tables for case, account, contact, lead, and
opportunity data objects, each containing pre-defined fields. It
should be understood that the word "entity" may also be used
interchangeably herein with "object" and "table".
In some multi-tenant database systems, tenants may be allowed to
create and store custom objects, or they may be allowed to
customize standard entities or objects, for example by creating
custom fields for standard objects, including custom index fields.
Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 7,779,039, titled CUSTOM ENTITIES
AND FIELDS IN A MULTI-TENANT DATABASE SYSTEM, by Weissman et al.,
issued on Aug. 17, 2010, and hereby incorporated by reference in
its entirety and for all purposes, teaches systems and methods for
creating custom objects as well as customizing standard objects in
a multi-tenant database system. In certain implementations, for
example, all custom entity data rows are stored in a single
multi-tenant physical table, which may contain multiple logical
tables per organization. It is transparent to customers that their
multiple "tables" are in fact stored in one large table or that
their data may be stored in the same table as the data of other
customers.
FIG. 10A shows a system diagram of an example of architectural
components of an on-demand database service environment 900, in
accordance with some implementations. A client machine located in
the cloud 904, generally referring to one or more networks in
combination, as described herein, may communicate with the
on-demand database service environment via one or more edge routers
908 and 912. A client machine can be any of the examples of user
systems 12 described above. The edge routers may communicate with
one or more core switches 920 and 924 via firewall 916. The core
switches may communicate with a load balancer 928, which may
distribute server load over different pods, such as the pods 940
and 944. The pods 940 and 944, which may each include one or more
servers and/or other computing resources, may perform data
processing and other operations used to provide on-demand services.
Communication with the pods may be conducted via pod switches 932
and 936. Components of the on-demand database service environment
may communicate with a database storage 956 via a database firewall
948 and a database switch 952.
As shown in FIGS. 10A and 10B, accessing an on-demand database
service environment may involve communications transmitted among a
variety of different hardware and/or software components. Further,
the on-demand database service environment 900 is a simplified
representation of an actual on-demand database service environment.
For example, while only one or two devices of each type are shown
in FIGS. 10A and 10B, some implementations of an on-demand database
service environment may include anywhere from one to many devices
of each type. Also, the on-demand database service environment need
not include each device shown in FIGS. 10A and 10B, or may include
additional devices not shown in FIGS. 10A and 10B.
Moreover, one or more of the devices in the on-demand database
service environment 900 may be implemented on the same physical
device or on different hardware. Some devices may be implemented
using hardware or a combination of hardware and software. Thus,
terms such as "data processing apparatus," "machine," "server" and
"device" as used herein are not limited to a single hardware
device, but rather include any hardware and software configured to
provide the described functionality.
The cloud 904 is intended to refer to a data network or combination
of data networks, often including the Internet. Client machines
located in the cloud 904 may communicate with the on-demand
database service environment to access services provided by the
on-demand database service environment. For example, client
machines may access the on-demand database service environment to
retrieve, store, edit, and/or process information.
In some implementations, the edge routers 908 and 912 route packets
between the cloud 904 and other components of the on-demand
database service environment 900. The edge routers 908 and 912 may
employ the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP). The BGP is the core
routing protocol of the Internet. The edge routers 908 and 912 may
maintain a table of IP networks or `prefixes`, which designate
network reachability among autonomous systems on the Internet.
In one or more implementations, the firewall 916 may protect the
inner components of the on-demand database service environment 900
from Internet traffic. The firewall 916 may block, permit, or deny
access to the inner components of the on-demand database service
environment 900 based upon a set of rules and other criteria. The
firewall 916 may act as one or more of a packet filter, an
application gateway, a stateful filter, a proxy server, or any
other type of firewall.
In some implementations, the core switches 920 and 924 are
high-capacity switches that transfer packets within the on-demand
database service environment 900. The core switches 920 and 924 may
be configured as network bridges that quickly route data between
different components within the on-demand database service
environment. In some implementations, the use of two or more core
switches 920 and 924 may provide redundancy and/or reduced
latency.
In some implementations, the pods 940 and 944 may perform the core
data processing and service functions provided by the on-demand
database service environment. Each pod may include various types of
hardware and/or software computing resources. An example of the pod
architecture is discussed in greater detail with reference to FIG.
10B.
In some implementations, communication between the pods 940 and 944
may be conducted via the pod switches 932 and 936. The pod switches
932 and 936 may facilitate communication between the pods 940 and
944 and client machines located in the cloud 904, for example via
core switches 920 and 924. Also, the pod switches 932 and 936 may
facilitate communication between the pods 940 and 944 and the
database storage 956.
In some implementations, the load balancer 928 may distribute
workload between the pods 940 and 944. Balancing the on-demand
service requests between the pods may assist in improving the use
of resources, increasing throughput, reducing response times,
and/or reducing overhead. The load balancer 928 may include
multilayer switches to analyze and forward traffic.
In some implementations, access to the database storage 956 may be
guarded by a database firewall 948. The database firewall 948 may
act as a computer application firewall operating at the database
application layer of a protocol stack. The database firewall 948
may protect the database storage 956 from application attacks such
as structure query language (SQL) injection, database rootkits, and
unauthorized information disclosure.
In some implementations, the database firewall 948 may include a
host using one or more forms of reverse proxy services to proxy
traffic before passing it to a gateway router. The database
firewall 948 may inspect the contents of database traffic and block
certain content or database requests. The database firewall 948 may
work on the SQL application level atop the TCP/IP stack, managing
applications' connection to the database or SQL management
interfaces as well as intercepting and enforcing packets traveling
to or from a database network or application interface.
In some implementations, communication with the database storage
956 may be conducted via the database switch 952. The multi-tenant
database storage 956 may include more than one hardware and/or
software components for handling database queries. Accordingly, the
database switch 952 may direct database queries transmitted by
other components of the on-demand database service environment
(e.g., the pods 940 and 944) to the correct components within the
database storage 956.
In some implementations, the database storage 956 is an on-demand
database system shared by many different organizations. The
on-demand database service may employ a multi-tenant approach, a
virtualized approach, or any other type of database approach.
On-demand database services are discussed in greater detail with
reference to FIGS. 10A and 10B.
FIG. 10B shows a system diagram further illustrating an example of
architectural components of an on-demand database service
environment, in accordance with some implementations. The pod 944
may be used to render services to a user of the on-demand database
service environment 900. In some implementations, each pod may
include a variety of servers and/or other systems. The pod 944
includes one or more content batch servers 964, content search
servers 968, query servers 982, file servers 986, access control
system (ACS) servers 980, batch servers 984, and app servers 988.
Also, the pod 944 includes database instances 990, quick file
systems (QFS) 992, and indexers 994. In one or more
implementations, some or all communication between the servers in
the pod 944 may be transmitted via the switch 936.
The content batch servers 964 may handle requests internal to the
pod. These requests may be long-running and/or not tied to a
particular customer. For example, the content batch servers 964 may
handle requests related to log mining, cleanup work, and
maintenance tasks.
The content search servers 968 may provide query and indexer
functions. For example, the functions provided by the content
search servers 968 may allow users to search through content stored
in the on-demand database service environment.
The file servers 986 may manage requests for information stored in
the file storage 998. The file storage 998 may store information
such as documents, images, and basic large objects (BLOBs). By
managing requests for information using the file servers 986, the
image footprint on the database may be reduced.
The query servers 982 may be used to retrieve information from one
or more file systems. For example, the query system 982 may receive
requests for information from the app servers 988 and then transmit
information queries to the NFS 996 located outside the pod.
The pod 944 may share a database instance 990 configured as a
multi-tenant environment in which different organizations share
access to the same database. Additionally, services rendered by the
pod 944 may call upon various hardware and/or software resources.
In some implementations, the ACS servers 980 may control access to
data, hardware resources, or software resources.
In some implementations, the batch servers 984 may process batch
jobs, which are used to run tasks at specified times. Thus, the
batch servers 984 may transmit instructions to other servers, such
as the app servers 988, to trigger the batch jobs.
In some implementations, the QFS 992 may be an open source file
system available from Sun Microsystems.RTM. of Santa Clara, Calif.
The QFS may serve as a rapid-access file system for storing and
accessing information available within the pod 944. The QFS 992 may
support some volume management capabilities, allowing many disks to
be grouped together into a file system. File system metadata can be
kept on a separate set of disks, which may be useful for streaming
applications where long disk seeks cannot be tolerated. Thus, the
QFS system may communicate with one or more content search servers
968 and/or indexers 994 to identify, retrieve, move, and/or update
data stored in the network file systems 996 and/or other storage
systems.
In some implementations, one or more query servers 982 may
communicate with the NFS 996 to retrieve and/or update information
stored outside of the pod 944. The NFS 996 may allow servers
located in the pod 944 to access information to access files over a
network in a manner similar to how local storage is accessed.
In some implementations, queries from the query servers 922 may be
transmitted to the NFS 996 via the load balancer 928, which may
distribute resource requests over various resources available in
the on-demand database service environment. The NFS 996 may also
communicate with the QFS 992 to update the information stored on
the NFS 996 and/or to provide information to the QFS 992 for use by
servers located within the pod 944.
In some implementations, the pod may include one or more database
instances 990. The database instance 990 may transmit information
to the QFS 992. When information is transmitted to the QFS, it may
be available for use by servers within the pod 944 without using an
additional database call.
In some implementations, database information may be transmitted to
the indexer 994. Indexer 994 may provide an index of information
available in the database 990 and/or QFS 992. The index information
may be provided to file servers 986 and/or the QFS 992.
Some but not all of the techniques described or referenced herein
are implemented as part of or in conjunction with a social
networking database system, also referred to herein as a social
networking system or as a social network. Social networking systems
have become a popular way to facilitate communication among people,
any of whom can be recognized as users of a social networking
system. One example of a social networking system is Chatter.RTM.,
provided by salesforce.com, inc. of San Francisco, Calif.
salesforce.com, inc. is a provider of social networking services,
CRM services and other database management services, any of which
can be accessed and used in conjunction with the techniques
disclosed herein in some implementations. These various services
can be provided in a cloud computing environment, for example, in
the context of a multi-tenant database system. Thus, the disclosed
techniques can be implemented without having to install software
locally, that is, on computing devices of users interacting with
services available through the cloud. While the disclosed
implementations are often described with reference to Chatter.RTM.,
those skilled in the art should understand that the disclosed
techniques are neither limited to Chatter.RTM. nor to any other
services and systems provided by salesforce.com, inc. and can be
implemented in the context of various other database systems and/or
social networking systems such as Facebook.RTM., LinkedIn.RTM.,
Twitter.RTM., Google+.RTM., Yammer.RTM. and Jive.RTM. by way of
example only.
Some social networking systems can be implemented in various
settings, including organizations. For instance, a social
networking system can be implemented to connect users within an
enterprise such as a company or business partnership, or a group of
users within such an organization. For instance, Chatter.RTM. can
be used by employee users in a division of a business organization
to share data, communicate, and collaborate with each other for
various social purposes often involving the business of the
organization. In the example of a multi-tenant database system,
each organization or group within the organization can be a
respective tenant of the system, as described in greater detail
herein.
In some social networking systems, users can access one or more
social network feeds, which include information updates presented
as items or entries in the feed. Such a feed item can include a
single information update or a collection of individual information
updates. A feed item can include various types of data including
character-based data, audio data, image data and/or video data. A
social network feed can be displayed in a graphical user interface
(GUI) on a display device such as the display of a computing device
as described herein. The information updates can include various
social network data from various sources and can be stored in an
on-demand database service environment. In some implementations,
the disclosed methods, apparatus, systems, and computer-readable
storage media may be configured or designed for use in a
multi-tenant database environment.
In some implementations, a social networking system may allow a
user to follow data objects in the form of CRM records such as
cases, accounts, or opportunities, in addition to following
individual users and groups of users. The "following" of a record
stored in a database, as described in greater detail herein, allows
a user to track the progress of that record when the user is
subscribed to the record. Updates to the record, also referred to
herein as changes to the record, are one type of information update
that can occur and be noted on a social network feed such as a
record feed or a news feed of a user subscribed to the record.
Examples of record updates include field changes in the record,
updates to the status of a record, as well as the creation of the
record itself. Some records are publicly accessible, such that any
user can follow the record, while other records are private, for
which appropriate security clearance/permissions are a prerequisite
to a user following the record.
Information updates can include various types of updates, which may
or may not be linked with a particular record. For example,
information updates can be social media messages submitted by a
user or can otherwise be generated in response to user actions or
in response to events. Examples of social media messages include:
posts, comments, indications of a user's personal preferences such
as "likes" and "dislikes", updates to a user's status, uploaded
files, and user-submitted hyperlinks to social network data or
other network data such as various documents and/or web pages on
the Internet. Posts can include alpha-numeric or other
character-based user inputs such as words, phrases, statements,
questions, emotional expressions, and/or symbols. Comments
generally refer to responses to posts or to other information
updates, such as words, phrases, statements, answers, questions,
and reactionary emotional expressions and/or symbols. Multimedia
data can be included in, linked with, or attached to a post or
comment. For example, a post can include textual statements in
combination with a JPEG image or animated image. A like or dislike
can be submitted in response to a particular post or comment.
Examples of uploaded files include presentations, documents,
multimedia files, and the like.
Users can follow a record by subscribing to the record, as
mentioned above. Users can also follow other entities such as other
types of data objects, other users, and groups of users. Feed
tracked updates regarding such entities are one type of information
update that can be received and included in the user's news feed.
Any number of users can follow a particular entity and thus view
information updates pertaining to that entity on the users'
respective news feeds. In some social networks, users may follow
each other by establishing connections with each other, sometimes
referred to as "friending" one another. By establishing such a
connection, one user may be able to see information generated by,
generated about, or otherwise associated with another user. For
instance, a first user may be able to see information posted by a
second user to the second user's personal social network page. One
implementation of such a personal social network page is a user's
profile page, for example, in the form of a web page representing
the user's profile. In one example, when the first user is
following the second user, the first user's news feed can receive a
post from the second user submitted to the second user's profile
feed. A user's profile feed is also referred to herein as the
user's "wall," which is one example of a social network feed
displayed on the user's profile page.
In some implementations, a social network feed may be specific to a
group of users of a social networking system. For instance, a group
of users may publish a news feed. Members of the group may view and
post to this group feed in accordance with a permissions
configuration for the feed and the group. Information updates in a
group context can also include changes to group status
information.
In some implementations, when data such as posts or comments input
from one or more users are submitted to a social network feed for a
particular user, group, object, or other construct within a social
networking system, an email notification or other type of network
communication may be transmitted to all users following the user,
group, or object in addition to the inclusion of the data as a feed
item in one or more feeds, such as a user's profile feed, a news
feed, or a record feed. In some social networking systems, the
occurrence of such a notification is limited to the first instance
of a published input, which may form part of a larger conversation.
For instance, a notification may be transmitted for an initial
post, but not for comments on the post. In some other
implementations, a separate notification is transmitted for each
such information update.
The term "multi-tenant database system" generally refers to those
systems in which various elements of hardware and/or software of a
database system may be shared by one or more customers. For
example, a given application server may simultaneously process
requests for a great number of customers, and a given database
table may store rows of data such as feed items for a potentially
much greater number of customers.
An example of a "user profile" or "user's profile" is a database
object or set of objects configured to store and maintain data
about a given user of a social networking system and/or database
system. The data can include general information, such as name,
title, phone number, a photo, a biographical summary, and a status,
e.g., text describing what the user is currently doing. As
mentioned herein, the data can include social media messages
created by other users. Where there are multiple tenants, a user is
typically associated with a particular tenant. For example, a user
could be a salesperson of a company, which is a tenant of the
database system that provides a database service.
The term "record" generally refers to a data entity having fields
with values and stored in database system. An example of a record
is an instance of a data object created by a user of the database
service, for example, in the form of a CRM record about a
particular (actual or potential) business relationship or project.
The record can have a data structure defined by the database
service (a standard object) or defined by a user (custom object).
For example, a record can be for a business partner or potential
business partner (e.g., a client, vendor, distributor, etc.) of the
user, and can include information describing an entire company,
subsidiaries, or contacts at the company. As another example, a
record can be a project that the user is working on, such as an
opportunity (e.g., a possible sale) with an existing partner, or a
project that the user is trying to get. In one implementation of a
multi-tenant database system, each record for the tenants has a
unique identifier stored in a common table. A record has data
fields that are defined by the structure of the object (e.g.,
fields of certain data types and purposes). A record can also have
custom fields defined by a user. A field can be another record or
include links thereto, thereby providing a parent-child
relationship between the records.
The terms "social network feed" and "feed" are used interchangeably
herein and generally refer to a combination (e.g., a list) of feed
items or entries with various types of information and data. Such
feed items can be stored and maintained in one or more database
tables, e.g., as rows in the table(s), that can be accessed to
retrieve relevant information to be presented as part of a
displayed feed. The term "feed item" (or feed element) generally
refers to an item of information, which can be presented in the
feed such as a post submitted by a user. Feed items of information
about a user can be presented in a user's profile feed of the
database, while feed items of information about a record can be
presented in a record feed in the database, by way of example. A
profile feed and a record feed are examples of different types of
social network feeds. A second user following a first user and a
record can receive the feed items associated with the first user
and the record for display in the second user's news feed, which is
another type of social network feed. In some implementations, the
feed items from any number of followed users and records can be
combined into a single social network feed of a particular
user.
As examples, a feed item can be a social media message, such as a
user-generated post of text data, and a feed tracked update to a
record or profile, such as a change to a field of the record. Feed
tracked updates are described in greater detail herein. A feed can
be a combination of social media messages and feed tracked updates.
Social media messages include text created by a user, and may
include other data as well. Examples of social media messages
include posts, user status updates, and comments. Social media
messages can be created for a user's profile or for a record. Posts
can be created by various users, potentially any user, although
some restrictions can be applied. As an example, posts can be made
to a wall section of a user's profile page (which can include a
number of recent posts) or a section of a record that includes
multiple posts. The posts can be organized in chronological order
when displayed in a GUI, for instance, on the user's profile page,
as part of the user's profile feed. In contrast to a post, a user
status update changes a status of a user and can be made by that
user or an administrator. A record can also have a status, the
update of which can be provided by an owner of the record or other
users having suitable write access permissions to the record. The
owner can be a single user, multiple users, or a group.
In some implementations, a comment can be made on any feed item. In
some implementations, comments are organized as a list explicitly
tied to a particular feed tracked update, post, or status update.
In some implementations, comments may not be listed in the first
layer (in a hierarchal sense) of feed items, but listed as a second
layer branching from a particular first layer feed item.
A "feed tracked update," also referred to herein as a "feed
update," is one type of information update and generally refers to
data representing an event. A feed tracked update can include text
generated by the database system in response to the event, to be
provided as one or more feed items for possible inclusion in one or
more feeds. In one implementation, the data can initially be
stored, and then the database system can later use the data to
create text for describing the event. Both the data and/or the text
can be a feed tracked update, as used herein. In various
implementations, an event can be an update of a record and/or can
be triggered by a specific action by a user. Which actions trigger
an event can be configurable. Which events have feed tracked
updates created and which feed updates are sent to which users can
also be configurable. Social media messages and other types of feed
updates can be stored as a field or child object of the record. For
example, the feed can be stored as a child object of the
record.
A "group" is generally a collection of users. In some
implementations, the group may be defined as users with a same or
similar attribute, or by membership. In some implementations, a
"group feed", also referred to herein as a "group news feed",
includes one or more feed items about any user in the group. In
some implementations, the group feed also includes information
updates and other feed items that are about the group as a whole,
the group's purpose, the group's description, and group records and
other objects stored in association with the group. Threads of
information updates including group record updates and social media
messages, such as posts, comments, likes, etc., can define group
conversations and change over time.
An "entity feed" or "record feed" generally refers to a feed of
feed items about a particular record in the database. Such feed
items can include feed tracked updates about changes to the record
and posts made by users about the record. An entity feed can be
composed of any type of feed item. Such a feed can be displayed on
a page such as a web page associated with the record, e.g., a home
page of the record. As used herein, a "profile feed" or "user's
profile feed" generally refers to a feed of feed items about a
particular user. In one example, the feed items for a profile feed
include posts and comments that other users make about or send to
the particular user, and status updates made by the particular
user. Such a profile feed can be displayed on a page associated
with the particular user. In another example, feed items in a
profile feed could include posts made by the particular user and
feed tracked updates initiated based on actions of the particular
user.
While some of the disclosed implementations may be described with
reference to a system having an application server providing a
front end for an on-demand database service capable of supporting
multiple tenants, the disclosed implementations are not limited to
multi-tenant databases nor deployment on application servers. Some
implementations may be practiced using various database
architectures such as ORACLE.RTM., DB2.RTM. by IBM and the like
without departing from the scope of the implementations
claimed.
It should be understood that some of the disclosed implementations
can be embodied in the form of control logic using hardware and/or
computer software in a modular or integrated manner. Other ways
and/or methods are possible using hardware and a combination of
hardware and software.
Any of the disclosed implementations may be embodied in various
types of hardware, software, firmware, and combinations thereof.
For example, some techniques disclosed herein may be implemented,
at least in part, by computer-readable media that include program
instructions, state information, etc., for performing various
services and operations described herein. Examples of program
instructions include both machine code, such as produced by a
compiler, and files containing higher-level code that may be
executed by a computing device such as a server or other data
processing apparatus using an interpreter. Examples of
computer-readable media include, but are not limited to: magnetic
media such as hard disks, floppy disks, and magnetic tape; optical
media such as flash memory, compact disk (CD) or digital versatile
disk (DVD); magneto-optical media; and hardware devices specially
configured to store program instructions, such as read-only memory
("ROM") devices and random access memory ("RAM") devices. A
computer-readable medium may be any combination of such storage
devices.
Any of the operations and techniques described in this application
may be implemented as software code to be executed by a processor
using any suitable computer language such as, for example, Java,
C++ or Perl using, for example, object-oriented techniques. The
software code may be stored as a series of instructions or commands
on a computer-readable medium. Computer-readable media encoded with
the software/program code may be packaged with a compatible device
or provided separately from other devices (e.g., via Internet
download). Any such computer-readable medium may reside on or
within a single computing device or an entire computer system, and
may be among other computer-readable media within a system or
network. A computer system or computing device may include a
monitor, printer, or other suitable display for providing any of
the results mentioned herein to a user.
While various implementations have been described herein, it should
be understood that they have been presented by way of example only,
and not limitation. Thus, the breadth and scope of the present
application should not be limited by any of the implementations
described herein, but should be defined only in accordance with the
following and later-submitted claims and their equivalents.
* * * * *
References